The market for personal electronic devices, for example, cell phones, personal digital assistants (PDA's), digital cameras, and music playback devices (MP3), is very competitive. Manufactures are constantly improving their product with each model in an attempt to reduce costs. Many times these improvements do not relate directly to the functionality of the product.
The look and feel of personal portable electronic devices is now a key product differentiator and one of the most significant reasons that consumers choose specific models. From a business standpoint, these outstanding designs (form and appearance) increase market share and margin.
In many portable electronic devices, such as mobile communication devices, individual touch keys, keypads, icons for indicating information, or the housing may be lighted. For keys or a simple icon display on the surface of a housing, for example, light emitting diodes have provided light through a small portion of a surface of the housing to illuminate an icon to a user.
However, it is desired to consume as little power as possible while maximizing luminance and achieving a more exact wavelength of the emitted light.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a method and apparatus for selectively backlighting a material. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background.